Edward Snowden's Country Of Choice Has An Even Worse Surveillance Record

Anti-surveillance hero Edward Snowden ironically wants to take
shelter in a country with a terrible surveillance record:
Ecuador.

The 30-year-old former Booz Allen contractor, thought to be in
Moscow after leaking top secret documents on domestic spying
conducted by the NSA, has petitioned for asylum in the South
American country that also sheltered Wikileaks founder Julian
Assange.

Secret documents obtainedby Rosie Gray at BuzzFeed
indicate Ecuador has a record of spying on social media,
targeting of political opponents and journalists, and innovation
in facial recognition, as well as the recent purchase
of a "GSM Interceptor"
by SENAIN, Ecuador's intelligence service.

Gray writes:

In a letter to Pablo Romero last year in June, a Smart Solutions
representative named Gabriel Guecelevich touted the capabilities
of the GSM system, promising the ability to “copy SIM cards,
identify phone calls, route phone calls to different places,
intercept text messages, falsify and modify the text messages,
keep messages in their system, disconnect calls, block phone
calls, system should be able to intercept a minimum of 4 phone
calls simultaneously.”

...

Guecelevich also specified that the GSM system, which has
previously been mentioned in WikiLeaks files as a spy tool, can
be used from a car that is 250 meters away and that it is
portable. Guecelevich explained which tests Smart Solutions can
run to prove that the system works. The first system, he wrote,
is intercepting technology; the second is a passive system that
can intercept GSM communication which Guecelevich promised can
process 32 channels simultaneously, record conversations, among
other capabilities.

[Ecuador] ranks 119th out of 179 countries on Reporter Without
Borders' Press Freedom Index, and Human Rights
Watch says "President Rafael Correa has undercut
freedom of the press in Ecuador by subjecting journalists and
media figures to public denunciation and retaliatory
litigation."

With a trade deal expiring at the end of July, the U.S. has
serious leverage of $9 billion per year.

"What would we gain from giving political asylum to Snowden
— confirming Ecuador's international image as an anti-imperialist
country?" the head of the Ecuadorian Business
Committee, Roberto Aspiazu, told AFP. "I don't think we need
that."